His life did not always reflect this - but whose life does? But, it’s clear he got it.

I think the sermon struck the proper balance of sensitivity to the subject while speaking Biblical truth. Timely, but timeless truths contained within.

First, I really appreciate your post and understand with some personal sympathy the struggle.

Second, let me offer an explanation re. the article. Yes, we do hold to the doctrine of election so I agree with you, rightly held, it does mean that “the gospel can change those whom God has chosen and is enabling to receive it.”

But (and maybe this goes in some part to the struggle you are having with the idea of election) we trust in a loving sovereign God who thankfully does the electing and not us. So in our experience, as we look around at who to bring the gospel to, or look at our families and friends and ask (as we tend to) who’s most likely to become a Christian - what this idea is reminding us is that again in our experience and knowledge there’s no predicting it. God can, yes, choose, whomever He will; our responsibility is to take the Great Commission very seriously and commit ourselves to offering the gospel to anyone, anywhere.

If that is so - then there’s no use in either excessively worrying about whom the elect are (if you love Jesus and the gospel I’d say that’s a pretty good indication that you’re at least as elect as any Reformed believer), nor is there any excuse for any arrogance by those who hold to the doctrine (after all it says we are entirely dependent on God to rescue us), nor is there any reason to fear an electing God (if as we read in Scripture that He is utterly loving and just and kind). The doctrine of election is difficult but I think it’s meant as a comfort to the Church that even in the worse times God has a plan and will bring us through as we depend upon Him. I think, it’s also meant as a comfort to people seeking God that wherever they are on the journey, He is drawing them and aiding them - it’s not just up to them.

Finally, in my experience (and I’m sorry I only have time to answer one of your questions today) Presbyterians often don’t understand the application of their own doctrine let alone others who disagree, so let me offer these articles (below) which at least helped me a lot. Thanks again for your post.

Every blessing,

Steve Constable

Predestination and Human Choice
Article by Jerram Barrs, “Predestination and Human Choice”
© L’Abri Fellowship, July 30, 1981

I HAVE THE RESPONSIBILITY TO CHOOSE WHETHER TO SEEK GOD AND BELIEVE OR NOT:

GOD CHOOSES ME TO BELONG TO HIM AS PART OF HIS PLAN FOR THE WHOLE OF HISTORY

Can we believe that both of these statements are true? Are they not contradictory? If we think they are contradictory which one will we decide is more important and try to hold on to, and which will we explain away? These are questions which concern all Christians, for there are two sets of ideas which seem hard to reconcile.

GOD……..elects (chooses) people…. predestines people(decides their destiny in advance)…..is sovereign (has a purpose he is working out in history)

PEOPLE… ……have freedom to choose……are responsible for the choices they make ……will be judged by God on the basis of their choices

If people are elected by God, how can we have freedom to choose?

If God predestines us, how can he call us to account for the choices we make?

If what we choose to do affects the course of history, how can God at the same time be in control?

There are several factors which require us to hold both truths together.

A. The Bible:
There are many strong statements throughout the Bible about God’s plans in history both for the nations and for individuals. For example, the apostle Paul writes: “In Christ we are chosen, having been predestined according to the plan of him who works out everything in conformity with the purpose of His will.” Some groups in the Church have taken such passages and said that they mean that God plans everything and therefore people are simply passive – rather like actors playing parts in a play making entrances and exits at the author’s will. However there are equally strong statements in the Bible about the responsibility of people to choose and about God’s response to human choices. John writes: “Whoever believes in Jesus is not condemned but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son.” Some have taken this kind of passage to mean that everything depends on human choice and therefore God is a passive observer, sitting in heaven, simply conforming what people decide.

The only way that justice can be done to the many passages of both kinds is to hold them together.

B. Our experience also demands that we believe both. Try thinking about prayer. We choose to pray and we believe that our praying makes a difference. Yet at the same time we must believe that God is able to work out His purposes into our own history otherwise why are we praying to Him? Further if our prayers are answered through the means of another Christian do we regard the person simply as a puppet under the total control of God? No, we thank them for their help, and also we thank God for answering our prayer. In practice then all Christians believe both in the sovereign power of God and in human choice and responsibility.

C. Problems of denying one or the other.
As we have seen some Christians think it wise to deny either God’s sovereignty or human choice in order to defend the other, or because to hold both seems illogical. What happens if we deny human responsibility? People become puppets or robots pushed around the stage of history. Also Biblical statements like: “God is not willing that any should perish but wants everyone to come to repentance” have to be ignored or explained away. Further, God is made to be responsible for sin and suffering in the world, even though the Bible explicitly denies this.

What happens if God’s sovereignty is denied? People become the only real decision makers. God becomes an ineffectual figure unable to do what He wishes, frustrated at every turn by people and Satan. God is not only unable to plan for the future, but may even be taken by surprise by some unexpected twist of history. We would be unable to have any confidence that God could deliver us individually, or that He could bring this age to a close with Christ’s return. It hardly needs to be said that all such ideas are rejected by the Bible. Again we are encouraged to affirm both.

We can see the simultaneous working of human choice and divine sovereignty with particular force and clarity in the account of Christ’s death.

It was planned by God the Father before the foundation of the world, and foretold in detail in the Old Testament.

Jesus Christ himself chose freely to die for us on the cross. He purposefully went to Jerusalem because he knew he would die there. At the right time he provoked the authorities to even greater rage against him. We see him struggling with the choice in the garden of Gethsemane. He chose to go to the cross in obedience to His Father’s purpose.

It was the purpose of Pilate, Caiaphas, Herod and others in authority to kill Jesus. They were responsible for his death and God judged them for it. Satan also was involved thinking that Christ’s death would give him victory. Paul even says that if these rulers (human and Satanic) had realized what would result from Christ’s death they would not have crucified him. God took their choices, which were first causes, and used them in his sovereign purpose to bring about our salvation.

The interplay of God’s action and peoples’ action in Christ’s death is so twined together that Peter could say: “This man was handed over to you (the Jews) by God’s set purpose and foreknowledge; and you with the help of wicked men, put him to death by nailing him to the cross.”

From all this we can see that the two threads of predestination and human choice are inextricably woven. Christian groups have sometimes tried to make their faith easier to believe by removing one or other of the threads, but we have seen the problems that result. Thankfully we are not forced into this kind of rationalization with its horrifying consequences. Rather we have to accept that, as with the whole of life, our knowledge is limited, and so we may never be able to see how the two fit together. We after all are not the Creator but creatures, very little persons who do not have total comprehension of reality. We have to be content with affirming that both Scripture and our experience demand that we believe both in the sovereignty of God and in human responsibility.

Jerram Barrs

2. What is the Reformed Response to Evangelism?
Taken from an article in “The Banner of Truth”, Oct. 18, 1934 by Dr. JC deKorne

It is Reformed to preach election; it is not Reformed to deny or ignore or to permit the audience to ignore man’s responsibility.

It is Reformed to say that the whole process of salvation, beginning, middle and end, is of God; it is not Reformed to let the sinner go away with the idea that if he is not saved it is God’s fault.

It is Reformed to lay upon the conscience of every one who hears the Gospel the command: Turn ye, turn ye! It is not Reformed to tell him only that God is the Author of conversion.

It is Reformed to teach that, unless God initiates the work of grace in the heart, that work will never be begun; it is not Reformed to let the sinner think that in the matter of conversion God deals with him as though he were a stick or a stone…

We know enough about God to be able to say that He is sovereign and does not in any way depend upon man. We also know enough about man to be able to say that he has a responsibility to decide on questions he faces from day to day. We do not know enough about either God or man to be able to harmonize these two bits of knowledge.

No mission worker need ever hesitate or may ever hesitate to say boldly what Joshua said unto the people of Israel, “Choose ye this day whom ye will serve.” Let him who will, criticize you. You are not going beyond the bounds of Reformed truth when you urge men to a decision. You are doing what God himself does in His Word. And that is a mission worker’s highest ideal.
JC deKorne

Second, I do have some questions…

1) How can the statement, “One of the basic theological premises of City Church is that the gospel can change any one, any place.”(see above) be true if you are a Reformed Church? I love much about the Reformed tradition, but this is one area that I struggle with greatly. Shouldn’t the correct formula be, “One of the basic theological premises of City Church is that the gospel can change any one OF THE ELECT, any place?” I mean, I’ve never had assurance that I was one of the ELECT, so I struggle with Reformed offerings of the gospel. If it’s only offered to the ELECT and if I do not know if I am, then what rest and hope can I have?

I do love Jesus and the gospel presentation here is most superb…but, does this mean that you are not strict Calvinists? If so, I would very much like to visit your church… If not, then I’m afraid you should change the wording of your article, lest you lead folks astray! (By rights of your own theolgy!)

2) What are the excesses of dispensationalists and charismatics mentioned towards the end of the article?

Thank you,

Rivendell72